


Recuperation

by taeminuet



Series: Coven!AU [2]
Category: SHINee
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Shapeshifting, Sickfic, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2018-12-10
Packaged: 2019-09-15 09:55:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16931085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taeminuet/pseuds/taeminuet
Summary: But magic or no, a lack of sleep has a backlash eventually, and Minho foresaw Jonghyun getting sick only hours before it happened. Jinki’s been staying with him now, pouring Kibum’s tea into his mouth when he needs fluids and otherwise just staying with him and channeling good feelings to keep him from being miserable.But Jonghyun needs sleep more than anything else, and he was asleep early yesterday before Taemin ever got home. And when Taemin hasn’t seen Jonghyun in over 36 hours, well… he misses him, to say the least.In which Taemin is not used to Jonghyun getting this much sleep.





	Recuperation

It’s technically not closing time yet, but Taemin is heavily considering just shutting the shop down early. The sun is dipping low enough to ruin all the good sunny places to sleep, and Taemin has resorted to leaning heavily against the counter in human form and staring blankly at a door that hasn’t opened in over half an hour. 

“Do you think we’re going to get any more customers?” Jongin asks as if he read Taemin’s mind. Maybe it’s a familiar thing or maybe it’s just the way Taemin most likely looks like he’d do anything to not be here.

“How many people want to buy flowers at…” Taemin rolls his head slightly towards the clock on the back wall and squints at it. “7:30 at night?”

 Jongin cocks his head slightly to one side. “I mean…” he starts and then shrugs.

Taemin rolls his eyes and heaves himself off the counter, going to say goodbye to all the plants while Jongin closes out the register and sweeps lazily. Their shop is pretty great about staying clean thanks to Taemin – no dead leaves on the floor, no dried out petals. The few that look like they might fall soon, Taemin cups in his palms and channels his magic into until they’re rustling cheerily in the slight breeze caused by the motion of his body and the air conditioning.

“You in a hurry?” Jongin asks when Taemin is done and fidgeting almost pointedly near Jongin.

Taemin frowns at him. Jongin knows why he’s in a hurry. He wants to get home and he wants to see Jonghyun.

Normally Taemin is a little more casual about this. He wants to see his babes, but he gets it when Jinki isn’t around all the time or Kibum gets busy or Jonghyun spends whole nights writing songs and whole days resetting his sleep schedule.

But Jonghyun’s been on a song-writing kick lately, selling dreams and buying hours where he himself can stay up. But magic or no, a lack of sleep has a backlash eventually, and Minho foresaw Jonghyun getting sick only hours before it happened. Jinki’s been staying with him now, pouring Kibum’s tea into his mouth when he needs fluids and otherwise just staying with him and channeling good feelings to keep him from being miserable.

But Jonghyun needs sleep more than anything else, and he was asleep early yesterday, before Taemin ever got home. And when Taemin hasn’t seen Jonghyun in over 36 hours, well… he misses him, to say the least.

“Alright, alright,” Jongin says, not bothering to hide his laughter. To his credit, it doesn’t take him too much longer to finish, and they’re flipping the sign and locking the doors a good five minutes before they’re meant to even be closed, much less gone, but fuck it. It’s Taemin’s shop. And if anyone is dying to buy a bouquet in the next five minutes, they can deal with the shitty flowers from the supermarket on the other side of town.

They shift to walk home, Jongin’s eager puppy form bounding ahead and then returning to Taemin’s side because Taemin is both smaller and not as full of boundless energy as Jongin, but he’d be lying if he tried to pretend like he wasn’t going a little faster than normal, hurrying back home.

Minho is there when they get home, opening the door so that neither one of them has to shift, and Taemin rubs his face against Minho’s ankle gratefully in the approximately three seconds before Jongin bowls half into his arms, looking for pets. Minho laughs at both of them, ruffling Jongin’s fur and crouching down to both pet him and run his fingers over Taemin’s ears softly.

Taemin leans into it for a moment and then shakes his head out and cocks it towards Jonghyun’s room. Minho shrugs. “If he’s awake, I didn’t see anything about it, but I haven’t really been trying to.”

If Taemin were human right now he would frown. As it is, he lashes his tail irritably and pads towards Jonghyun’s room, pushing against the cracked door until it opens. Jonghyun is still in bed, and Jinki is sitting next to him with two thermoses of tea on the bedside table, and a book propped open on his knee. He’s reading it aloud, honey-sweet voice a soft murmur. His free hand runs absently through Jonghyun’s hair, a repeated motion that Taemin imagines would be soothing even without Jinki’s powers.

Jinki looks a bit tired himself, but nothing like Jonghyun, still passed out among tangled sheets, and Taemin gives a plaintive meow as he hops onto the bed. He’s debating changing so he can curl up around Jonghyun, but he knows he’s probably more useful like this as he climbs onto Jonghyun’s chest and begins purring, a low thrumming frequency that will hopefully help soothe him even more.

“His fever broke a few hours ago,” Jinki says, and it takes Taemin a moment to realize he’s not just reading anymore. The whole room feels warm and safe, and despite how Taemin feels about Jonghyun being sick, it’s hard to resist Jinki putting out waves of comfort. “He’s sleeping off the last of it, but he should wake up soon. Honestly, it’s probably better to let him sleep this much. You know when he wakes up, he’ll be right back on schedule.”

Taemin flicks an unhappy ear at that, but at least Jonghyun’s fever is broken. It’s a step up from before. And it’s not like Minho wouldn’t have seen if something awful was going to happen to Jonghyun, but still.

“Are you going to sleep too?” Jinki teases, stopping his stroking of Jonghyun for only a moment to pull teasingly at Taemin’s tail. Taemin has to actually go through he process of climbing off Jonghyun and the bed and changing back to give Jinki a properly affronted look, though now that he’s changed, it’s a lot easier to squirm into bed on the other side of Jonghyun and wrap an arm around him.

Sometimes, though not often, Taemin forgets just how  _small_  Jonghyun is. With Taemin switching sizes so often, perspective gets skewed, but with Jonghyun sleeping, his breathing raspy but even, his body soft and seemingly fragile under Taemin’s touches, Jonghyun seems so tiny.

Jinki’s voice slips back into the pages, reading the story, and he’s in the middle of a page in the middle of a chapter that Taemin knows nothing about, so much that his brain doesn’t even try to grasp it. For all Jinki’s teasing, Taemin does really slip in and out of consciousness, aware of Jonghyun’s breathing patterns and the soft rustle of pages, the occasional pause for Jinki to drink from his thermos to wet his mouth.

He’s aware when Kibum comes home from work, bringing a new thermos of tea and feeling Jonghyun’s forehead with the back of their hand before nodding. Their fingers touch briefly at Jinki’s hand, squeezing it before returning it so Jinki can turn a page, and they shake their head. ““Don’t you dare get sick on us too, okay?”

“I’m fine, Kibummie,” Jinki murmurs. “But if I need a break before he wakes up in a few hours, Taeminnie’s right here.”

Kibum hums agreement, and runs a soft touch through Taemin own hair, brushing it out of his face and seeming startled when Taemin opens his eyes and smiles up at them sleepily. “I’m here,” he echoes Jinki and feels pleased when Jinki smiles at him for supporting him. “Don’t worry too much. Jinki knows what he’s doing.”

Kibum looks slightly doubtful and mostly concerned, but they only say, “There’s a new bath bomb I’m trying to make that’s specifically to make your fur soft. Do you want to try it, or should I ask Jongin?”

Taemin hums thoughtfully before shrugging as minutely as he can while still getting the message across. “Jongin can have it. He’s been deprived of two of his major cuddlers for the last two days.”

Kibum smothers some kind of noise that by the shaking of their shoulders was probably a laugh, but they nod and leave the room.

 After a moment, Jinki smiles. “You should tell Jongin you care about him more often,” he murmurs. 

“Gay?” Taemin says, muffling a snort of laughter into Jonghyun’s shoulder before he thinks about it, and then freezes when Jonghyun shifts in his sleep, squirming awkwardly in a way that is apparently attempting to get his lower body closer to where Taemin’s arm is while simultaneously trying to arch his shoulders and head into Jinki’s touch.

There’s a momentary pause and then Jinki and Taemin both shuffle closer, cuddling Jonghyun up between them.

Jinki shakes his head. “You two are cute,” he says, and Taemin feels himself flush even if he has no idea whether Jinki means him and Jongin or him and Jonghyun. Either way, Jinki should tell that to them too, because both Jonghyun and Jongin would be pleased by the compliment.

“You’re cute,” Taemin hears mumbled sleepily between them, and looks down to see Jonghyun grinning dopily up at them. Taemin has no idea what was in the tea Jonghyun’s been getting, but he looks simultaneously giddy and exhausted, and Taemin feels his heart jump. 

“So are you,” he says, and cuddles Jonghyun closer. 

Jonghyun grins. “Hey, pretty kitty. You miss me?”

Taemin disguises his nod as just snuggling into Jonghyun’s shoulder.

“How do you feel?” Jinki murmurs, brushing a thumb over Jonghyun’s cheekbone fondly. 

“Uhm,” Jonghyun says, clearly weighing the options on his answer. After a moment, he has to give it up to sniffle. “Not great, but a bit better. Thanks, Jinx.”

“I’m glad.” Jinki smiles at the nickname and swoops down to press a kiss to Jonghyun’s forehead. When Jonghyun tips his head up for more though, Jinki shakes his head. “We’re trying not to spread this more than necessary.”

Taemin’s glad. He’s definitely in a cuddle Jonghyun’s to death mood. Not so much in a kissing mood. It’s kind of a great compromise that Jonghyun’s not actually allowed to do the second at the moment.

He nuzzles at Jonghyun while Jinki plies him with more tea, and before he’s even done, Minho is nudging open the door, apparently having Seen that Jonghyun’s awake. In his wake, Jongin follows, human now but with his eyes lit up and a question in them.

Taemin shakes his head. “We don’t dogpile sick people, Jongin,” he says ignoring exactly how wrapped around Jonghyun he is during that bit of hypocrisy. “What the fuck?”

Jongin scowls but he shifts and is exceedingly gentle when he climbs onto the bed, laying his muzzle on Jonghyun’s ankle. Minho sits down next to him. “Key’s getting more tea,” he says, and his eyes gleam with a smile when Jonghyun grimaces. “It  _will_  make you feel better.”

“ _It’ll make you feel better,_ ” Jonghyun whines grumpily, but he’s smiling at Minho, and when Jinki relinquishes his spot to stand up and stretch, Minho takes it and Jonghyun immediately snuggles against him too. Taemin huffs and is immediately a cat again, climbing into Jonghyun’s lap and rubbing against his stomach for attention. Minho’s seen Jonghyun lately – he hasn’t.

Jonghyun’s fingers are soft down the fur of his back, gentle and soothing, and Taemin starts purring again without intending to this time, comfortable in this spot.

_I missed you_ , he thinks, and it comes out as a meow as he butts his head against Jonghyun’s arm. 

And maybe he’s getting a little predictable because Jonghyun’s fingers curl down to scratch softly as he mumbles a slightly stuffy, “Missed you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Imported from [tumblr](http://taeminuet.tumblr.com).


End file.
